How I Survived Mental Abuse in My Relationship — and What You Can Learn From It

Closets are traditionally seen as the enemy of queer identity – if you're really yourself out in the open, you'll be awarded in a perfect world with love for who you really are. That’s not really how life works, though. For a long time, a physical closet was the only safe space in my life as a queer person: it was the only place my abusive girlfriend couldn’t contact me. The Teen Vogue beauty closet didn’t get any cell service, and it became my only refuge for the long, painful end to a relationship that put me on suicide watch more than once. It was in there that I’d go to remember I was still capable of understanding what beautiful things were, and what happiness can be: simple, and not up for argument. I am a survivor of gaslighting, and beauty pulled me out.

The term “gaslighting” comes from a 1938 play called "Gas Light," in which a husband leads his wife to believe she is insane to hide his own crimes. She sees the gas light in their house dim when he searches for jewels to steal, but, when she asks, he tells her the lights flickering are simply her overactive imagination. By the end of the play, nobody believes she's in her right mind, including herself.

My perception of the world while being gaslit was like a gigantic Rubik’s Cube I couldn't figure out. "Perhaps if I try harder, love more, win this argument, surrender enough, this will work out," I thought. I stopped eating much out of pure exhaustion from arguments. My friends didn't understand why I stayed, and I thought my explanations – my defenses – were just not good enough, that I wasn't being empathetic enough to my partner. I thought that the pain I was going through was really, in the end, all my fault. Whenever I tried to confront the situation, I was told nothing was wrong except for the fact I was upset, and for no real reason at all.

In a conversation with any of my girlfriends, we can all pull up instances similar to this like they’re a deck of cards. Meagan Rosario, an artist whose work focuses on misogyny, recalled the first instance of gaslighting she could remember. “I was 19. My boyfriend was a serial cheater so I went through his computer and saw proof that he had been messaging girls and hooking up. When I confronted him, he started yelling and turned it around on me,” she said. “He told me I didn’t know what I was talking about, how dare I not trust him, how dare I go through his things. He made me feel like a bad girlfriend and I ended up curled up in a ball crying as he destroyed my stuff. He told me it was my fault because I didn’t trust him and didn’t understand what I had seen. It wasn’t until I was in a healthy relationship years later that I understood what had happened before wasn’t right.”

Gaslighting refers to these experiences of emotional and mental manipulation and abuse. Dr. Robin Stern, an expert on gaslighting and author of the book The Gaslight Effect, calls this the “systematic attempt by one person to erode another person’s reality, by telling them that what they are experiencing isn’t so, and the gradual giving up on the part of the other person.” You see, it takes two people; it’s a dance of power and truth. Dr. Stern calls it “The Gaslight Tango.” I have never been a good dancer, but in this instance, I know every part.

Advertisement

We learn the first steps to it very early on. As teen girls and women, we're constantly told our experiences aren't real. We're told this every day and in every possible scenario. You may see it at the doctor's office: "Are you sure you're experiencing this illness, and it's not just something else?" Like your body is hysterical and you don't know yourself and have the test results for years on end to prove it. You may see it in interactions with police: was your "alleged" assault really a big deal, something you can blame others for? Did you not bring this on yourself because you are a "party girl"? It happens in the military, too: are you sure you're not just mentally unstable, and unfit to work? You don’t need to look anywhere farther than your local newsstand for proof that women are told over and over again that we’re not worth listening to, or that we are wrong. Thirty-five women spoke out about Bill Cosby before our culture started paying attention. They were all gaslit, too.

We are taught to shoulder the burden and the blame in every scenario, to say "sorry" every time we bother to talk. When we're being lied to about what is happening to us, when people argue with us about our truth, we're being told that our worth is on loan, that our realities and our truths are negotiable. Gaslighting teaches you that your mind isn't good or smart enough to be right about what is going on. It convinces you that if you try hard enough, lie correctly, and love harder, you can save your relationship with the person to whom you have given power, your trust, your love. Worth and love become a game of self-determination: maybe love, and strength in our love, can be enough. Maybe compromise will solve it all.

The secret I learned from experience: it won't. Some things fail, regardless of the effort involved. You can let it take you with it or you can move through it. When I realized I was on the path to my dream job but was using it as a crutch to escape my relationship, I knew I had to get out. I had to stop when I realized the only pleasurable things about my life were material. So I made a game plan; I wrote down a list of every effect the relationship had wrought on me: I lost weight and shrunk several sizes, my friends had to feed me to make sure I ate. I lost sleep and became reliant on NyQuil to the point where my friends had to monitor my intake. I started flinching at the sound of my ringtone for fear that it was my lover. I lost so much of myself that it didn’t matter at that point if I loved them or not. Love isn’t enough if it is physically destroying who you are. I read that list of changes out loud before I broke up with her on the phone, and blocked her on every platform. That was years ago, now.

I am writing this to you so you can save yourself – that is your mission. I still flinch sometimes when I hear that old ringtone, I still scan her old neighborhood for her face sometimes. I wish so deeply that this situation never happens to you. So I will teach you what I learned the hard way: your reality is not up for debate. Your empathy for others does not preclude reality and it does not excuse abuse. You have to recognize the start of the pattern, and you need to know that your instincts are a powerful tool – they could be what saves you. Because gaslighting is everywhere in different forms. By the legacy of your gender, you'll be doubted for your intellect, your talent, your worth. The ultimate success, your magic, your spell – how you will survive the endless attacks on your psyche and your heart – is to learn that it's not your fault. When you feel confused, when you second-guess yourself, when you apologize for the space you take up, when you wonder if you're "good enough", you must understand that it isn't your fault. It is not in your head despite what your partner is telling you. If it feels bad, it is bad, because you feel it. Breathe into your doubt: it is enough to feel bad about something, you need no excuses. You, precisely the way you are, are enough. Your instincts are undervalued and systematically discredited. You have to trust yourself.